They are wreaths of green, entwining They are fortune's richest treasure— Than what beareth pleasure's name. For their meed of soft caressing, Hardy labor toils with joy; "Children are the poor man's blessing"They his heart and hands employ. They-our only gifts immortal Live, when dies their earthly name; Though we leave them at death's portal We our children shall reclaim. THE FORCED MARRIAGE. BY THE AUTHOR OF THE 'ISLAND BRIDE." HE evening was dark and chill. Gertrude Fielding TH strolled pensively along the avenue that led to her home, a neat parsonage house in the parish of of which her father was the vicar. Ideas at once ominous and dispiriting poured rapidly through her mind as she approached the door. A throe of the fiercest anguish was felt at her heart when she directed her thoughts onward to the morrow, which was to see her a bride-but of whom? Of a man whom she loathed, yet had consented to espouse, in order to evade the frightful alternative of a father's curse. Her affianced suitor was a bachelor of immense wealth, but old, ungainly, and without a single virtue to balance these two latter disadvantages; while she was poor indeed, but young, beautiful, and innocent. Her sordid parent had readily embraced the offer of a wealthy debauchee, calculating, in the selfishness of his ambition, that such a connection would confer upon himself an D importance from the coveted enjoyment of which his narrow means had hitherto debarred him, and prove at the same time a stepping-stone to the advancement of his younger children, of whom he had several, and of which his quiver was not yet full. Poor Gertrude was to be immolated upon the altar of interest, a shrine upon which far worse than pagan sacrifices are frequently offered. She looked forward to the moment which was to unite her to a withered but wealthy sensualist, with a feeling little short of feverish disgust. She repaired early to her chamber, her temples throbbing, and the whole mass of her blood bounding through her frame, as if the "great deep" of the heart was "broken up" and a deluge was pouring through every vein, and threw herself upon her bed with a sigh so deep and poignant, that it seemed as though the very soul had been suddenly forced from the fair tenement in which it was enshrined, by one fierce convulsion of concentrated agony. The stars were bright in the heavens, but her destiny was dim and clouded. They appeared only as heavenly mockers of earthly woe. She had ceased to weep, to sigh, to murmur. Her sufferings were too acute for tears, for sighs, for murmurings; hers were the silent, unseen, absorbing agonies of despair, She did not sleep, or, if her senses were for a moment "lapped in oblivion," frightful dreams interrupted her slumbers, and she started from her pillow with the perturbation of bewildered horror, which too plainly told the intensity of her soul's emotions. On the following morning, pale and unrefreshed, with forebodings that struck like so many ice-bolts through her heart, she descended to the parlor, where a tolerably splendid breakfast was provided for those friends who had been invited to the wedding, and who shortly after assembled. The bridegroom was the last to make his appearance, but his bodily infirmities might have been fairly pleaded as his excuse; still he did not take advantage of a plea so extremely natural in an aged beau, though not very flattering either to his bride's choice or to his own discretion. Gertrude was dressed without a single ornament except a white rose in her hair, which she wore at the express desire of her mother; and though the suitor had presented her with sundry jewels and various expensive trinkets, they remained in their cases, to her worse than valueless, as they were mementoes of a sacrifice that would taint the pure spring of her existence, and make it henceforth gush from its troubled fountain, charged with the bitters of "gall and wormwood." Her eyes were dim with weeping. She saluted her friends mournfully, while her father affected a boisterous mirth that strikingly contrasted with the deep solemn gloom which was fixed upon his daughter's cheek, like an icicle upon the opening primrose. When the bridegroom was announced, Mr. Fielding darted towards the door to assist him from his carriage, from which he descended with some difficulty, and a few grimaces, and then hobbled into the room with all the decrepit agility of threescore and six, augmented by a life of early debauchery and continued indulgence. He was dressed with the elaborate gaiety of a confirmed man of the town;" his legs, which from the inclination of his head towards the horizon, formed almost a right angle with his upper man, were forced into a pair of light web pantaloons that showed to a miracle the prodigious preponderancy of skin and bone over flesh and blood. He shuffled towards the bride with a disgusting chuckle of delight, and courteously kissed her forehead: but she shrank from his contaminating touch with an instinctive loathing, and was about to evade the revolting caress, when her father's frown checked her. She passively submitted to the endearments of the senile representative of manhood with whom she was doomed to link her destiny. The marriage ceremony was performed by the bride's father. Pale, yet with a firm step and calm self-possession, she approached the altar, but when she was required to repeat the solemn declaration of conjugal fidelity and affection, her voice faltered, and, in spite of the natural energy of her resolution, she could scarcely articulate the customary obligation. She had, however, wound up |